Email Marketing: Today and Tomorrow

Email is one of the most powerful marketing tools. It's cheap, effective, and easy to use, but at the same time it can also damage a brand and company's reputation if not used properly.

Indeed, in recent times, skeptics have started belittling the effectiveness of email marketing, and many have called it dated.

What marketers say



Recent surveys prove disbelievers wrong and reveal that email is still a dependable tool for marketers. US firms alone spent $400 million on email marketing in 2006.

According to an annual survey of 2,000 online marketing professionals conducted by Datran Media in December 2007, 82 % of marketers said they will increase their use of email marketing in 2008. 67% of the respondents said that email helped boost sales, and about 55% said that ROI from email was higher than for other marketing vehicles. According to research conducted by the Direct Marketing Association, marketers predicted that ROI through email would be $45.65 in 2008.

Another survey, carried out by MarketingSherpa, of over 3,000 respondents in July 2007 revealed that the majority of marketers view email as the most powerful marketing tactic.

Why email works

For decades now email marketing has been used by businesses of all types and sizes. The reasons for its success have been various:

• It helps advertisers in sending information to a wide range of prospective customers at a relatively low cost. It incurs virtually no production or postage cost.
  
  
• Unlike a website, email helps advertisers communicate proactively with their current, as well as potential, customers.
  
  
• Aided by self-service tools, email newsletters, promotions, and announcements reach the target customers within minutes. In addition, marketers get immediate responses from prospects as the call to action in an email is unambiguous.
  
  
• Unlike other marketing tools, results from email campaigns are easily assessed. It is not difficult to find the number of people who saw an offer or newsletter and clicked on the links given in emails.

Disadvantages of email marketing

Differentiating between legitimate and spam email marketing has become a headache for both customers and advertisers. Secondly, there is increasing pressure from some quarters to allow potential customers to "opt out" from receiving unsolicited commercial email. Finally, the volume of spam is so high, and it resembles legitimate email to such an extent, that even smart users can be confused.

Some marketers also complain that filters frequently catch even legitimate commercial emails.

Common email marketing misconceptions

Here are some of the most common myths associated with email marketing:

Email is used simply because it is cheap.

The reality is that it is used because it creates revenue.

Businessmen can get new customers by emailing total strangers.

In fact, users hate spam. Emailing total strangers results only in annoyed recipients and decreased trust.

Only 20% to 25% of commercial email is opened and read.

Such statistics can easily be challenged because there is no way to really know with certainty whether an email was read. Email opens can be only tracked when users enable images to display or click on a link. And so, a user can read an email without the sender knowing whether or not the email was even opened.

Emails should contain as much information as possible.

Marketers should realize that emails are not reference material. People like to read them and delete them immediately.

Email is not dead

Spam, phishing, dropping open rates, and overloaded inboxes have made some people argue that email marketing is dead. Some detractors also say that email is a dirty technique. What is dying out in reality, however, is the illegitimate and immature use of the tool, which is welcome.

The problems email is facing today are simply growing pains which demand mature dealing, a better understanding of the medium, and responsible marketing.